Come out to the 5th annual So Cal Comic Con on Sunday, October 5h, from 10am-5pm, at the QLN Conference Center in Oceanside! Kids 13 and under, and any member of the military, get in for FREE! Our 2 Guests of Honor for this year’s show are Len Wein and Herb Trimpe. Both creators have an extensive history of work for the top 2 comic companies, and they are here to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Incredible Hulk #180 and #181, where Wolverine was created and introduced to the Marvel Universe! We also welcome back Special Guest John Kricfalusi, creator of Ren and Stimpy!

The 1st 100 people in line get a FREE gift bag STUFFED with cool comics. There are raffles throughout the day where you can win prizes like Sgt. Fury #1 from 1963 SIGNED by Stan Lee! Dozens of comic and toy vendors are on hand to sell your favorite Golden, Silver, Bronze, or Modern Age comics and toys. IDW Publishing and Aspen Comics will be in attendance, along with numerous comic creators, including:

The Art Auction will be held on Saturday May 17th, 2014. The blind auction will run throughout the day in the art gallery in the back of the hall, and will wrap up at 5:30 PM Interested parties must sign up for a bidder/paddle number and then can begin placing blind bids on the art they are interested in. Contributors include Mark Brooks (seen at left), Charlie Adlard, Frank Cho, Sanjulian, Michael Lark, Justin Greenwood, Toshio Maeda, Darick Robertson, Bill Morrison, and many many others! Full details at the link!

Art that does not receive three bids will sell for the highest offer at 5:30 PM, and ones that do get at least three bids will be placed in the live auction that begins at 6:30 PM in convention hall room B. Writer Ken Kristensen will be helping emcee the auction so if you are a Todd the Ugliest Kid on Earth fan, this will be a fun chance to hang out with Ken and hopefully buy some art! There will be a cash bar in the room, and hopefully a number artists that submitted their works to the auction in attendance.

Founded in 1979 as “Super-Con”, Big Wow! Comic Fest is not only Northern California’s Longest-Running Comic-Con, but is this year’s Only Major Comics Event in the San Francisco Bay Area! As the Original Artist-Friendly Show, we have Fantastic Comic Book Creator Guests spanning all decades and genres! This year we are pleased to welcome as our Featured Guests: CharlieAdlard (Artist for the popular “Walking Dead” series), Legendary Illustrator Neal Adams (Batman, X-Men, Avengers), Hellboy Creator Mike Mignola, Fan-Favorites Travis Charest (Weapons of the Metabarons), Art Adams (X-Men, Godzilla), and more Special Guests including: Dan Brereton (Nocturnals), Mike Zeck (Punisher, Spider-Man, Secret Wars), JoeLinsner (Dawn), Bill Morrison (The Simpsons, Futurama, Disney Poster Artist), Alex Nino (Dead Ahead), Sergio Aragones (Mad Magazine, Groo the Wanderer), Liam Sharp (Gears of War), and many more confirmed and added to our website! Over 200 Comic Creators!

Comments Off on Hero Initiative Heads to San Jose’s BIG WOW! Comic-Fest in May 2014

Press Release:

Hero Initiative, the non-profit organization that helps comic creators in medical and financial need, will be attending San Jose’s BIG WOW! Comic-Fest on May 17-18 at the San Jose Convention Center, 150 West San Carlos Street.

Make sure you grab the amazing Walking Dead 100 book at out booth, #915-#917 and be sure to get it signed by the many contributors in attendance! Walking Dead artist Charlie Adlard will be at the con, as will eight other artists who participated in the project. Proceeds of your purchase will help someone in need!

And you can put your Walking Dead book in your NEW Hero tote bag! Hero’s new totes make their debut at BIG WOW! and are available at a mere $5!

In addition, check out the ambassadors for Hero who will be raising money for our charity at their own booths: Arthur Adams, Brent Anderson, Dan Brereton, Joyce Chin, Mick Gray, Drew Johnson, Rich Koslowski, Michael Lark, John Livesay, Laura Martin, Terry Moore, Norm Rapmund, Darick Robertson, Greg Rucka, and David Williams will all have donation jars for Hero!

LOS ANGELES, CA (March 14, 2014) Hero Initiative, the non-profit organization that helps comic book creators in medical and financial need, hits the Emerald City Comic con in Seattle, Wa. March 28-30 at the Washington State Convention center.

And we’re bringing our party hats! Hero is celebrating 30 years of Stan Sakai’s Usagi Yojimbo at a party sponsored by Multiversity Comics and Dark Horse Comics! The party takes place at Rock Bottom Brewery, 1333 5th Avenue in Seattle, just four blocks from the convention center! Be there Friday March 28 at 8:00pm. Tickets are $10 at the door for this 21-and-over event. You can take party pics there at Seattle’s Facebooth (a photobooth worthy of your face!) and enter a raffle with great prizes to benefit Stan and Sharon Sakai!

The Hero Initiative is the first-ever federally chartered not-for-profit corporation dedicated strictly to helping comic book creators in need. Hero creates a financial safety net for yesterday’s creators who may need emergency medical aid, financial support for essentials of life, and an avenue back into paying work. It’s a chance for all of us to give back something to the people who have given us so much enjoyment.

Since its inception, The Hero Initiative has had the good fortune to grant over $500,000 to the comic book veterans who have paved the way for those in the industry today. For more information, visit www.heroinitiative.org or call 626-676-6354.

That’s right! Hero will have a foosball table at its booth, #406, all weekend. The table comes courtesy of Foosball Master Tour, and you can test your skills in special challenge matches against well-known artists Jon Bogdanove, Jimmy Palmiotti, Darick Robertson, and Alex Sinclair to raise money for Hero Initiative. Get practicing now!

The convention continues its dual traditions of Helping Hero and producing AMAZING limited edition prints with its They Live, Halloween, The Birds and The Hunger prints! Each print is limited to only 100 copies each, and available at $30 each at the Long Beach Con store in the main lobby. In addition, 30 copies each of They Live and Halloween will be available autographed by legendary director John Carpenter for $50 each at the Storm King Productions booth, #913 on the floor. All proceeds from They Live and Halloween benefit Hero, along with partial proceeds from The Birds and The Hunger!

And Hero is having a special $1 sale all weekend! You can pick up great product such as the Salimba graphic novel, Vision Machine graphic novel, and even Hero T-shirts at a mere $1 each! There’s a limit of one per item per customer, and supplies are limited, so get to booth #406 FAST!

Third Eye Faithful, we are totally excited to announce one of our biggest signings of the Summer with the arrival of Darick Robertson to Third Eye Comics this August! Darick is the legendary modern comics artist behind instant classics like TRANSMETROPOLITAN, THE BOYS, and HAPPY! He’s done a ton of other excellent work as well, in fact, we’d be here all day if we ran through the list. Let me just say this: we’re honored to have the man as a guest at our store this Summer in anticipation of his brand new creator-owned series, BALLISTIC, from BLACK MASK STUDIOS, the publishers of the recent 12 REASONS TO DIE comic.

What’s Darick’s new project, BALLISTIC, all about? Imagine the cult movie genius of REPO MAN (the ’80s one!) distilled into a modern day heist story. A madcap sci-fi buddy adventure about a wanna-be bank robber and his best friend Gun, a drug-addicted, foul-mouthed, living gun, marks Darick Robertson’s return to the hard sci-fi worldbuilding of his classic TRANSMETROPOLITAN mixed with THE BOYS’ ultra-violence.

Darick will be signing at Third Eye Annapolis from 11AM-1PM on Saturday 8/17. We’ll have plenty of copies of all his works available, including his new series, BALLISTIC!

With Overstreet, Lady Death and Ballistic exclusives, plus two great parties: Stone Brewing’s Hop-con and comiXology Meet Your Makers!

LOS ANGELES, CA (July 9, 2013) – The Hero Initiative, the charitable organization dedicated to helping veteran comic creators in medical or financial need, is travelling into Comic-Con International in San Diego July 17th-21st at the San Diego Convention center. We have exclusives, parties and special guests throughout the weekend that you will not want to miss! Booth #5003 is the place to be!

Hero is proud to release our exclusive limited edition of TheOverstreet Comic Book Price Guide #43. Now in its fifth decade, the Guide is the preeminent source for comic book pricing information, and SDCC is where to get it first! The cover, featuring Francine and Katchoo from Strangers in Paradise dressed as Wonder Woman and Zatanna is by famed SiP creator Terry Moore and colored by Brian Miller. This Hero-exclusive edition is limited to 500 copies in hardcover only at $35.

In addition, Hero has an exclusive Lady Death: Wicked Ways #1 with a new cover by Darick Robertson enhanced with Swarovski crystals and signed by Lady Death creator Brian Pulido. Only 99 copies have been made! This treasure comes bagged and boarded with certificate of Authenticity for $40.

And the brand-new Ballistic #1 makes its world premiere at the Hero booth! Ballistic is Darick Robertson and Adam Egypt Mortimer’s madcap, psychedelic, utterly wacko buddy adventure about Butch and his best friend Gun, a genetically modified, foul-mouthed firearm. Ballistic marks Darick Robertson’s return to the hard sci-fi world-building of his classic Transmetropolitan. This Hero Initiative variant features EXCLUSIVE cover art and is limited to only 500 copies at $10!

All three exclusives can be purchased at booth #5003 while supplies last!

And you gotta eat—even in San Diego! Five lucky winners will get the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to have lunch and get a sketch from famed Watchmen artist Dave Gibbons! Bid NOW in Hero’s eBay auctions!

Partygoers will have a great time with Hero, starting Wednesday, July 17 at 5 p.m. for Hop-Con! Star Trek’s Wil Wheaton and Fark.com’s Drew Curtis debut their new w00tstout beer at Stone Brewing’s World Bistro! Proceeds benefit Hero, so get your tickets NOW!

If that was not enough, the good times continue to roll Thursday night! The Hero Initiative and comiXology are sponsoring THE BLANK PAGE PROJECT hosted by Jimmy Palmiotti and Amanda Conner. Come and enjoy food and drinks while our creators will draw on to a gigantic 12-by-8-foot comic book page that will be auctioned off at a later date to benefir Hero. Hang out with Mark Waid, Arthur Adams, Thomas Jane, Phil Jimenez, Tim Bradstreet, Chris Moreno, Bill Morrison, Jose Delbo, Dan Jurgens, Denny O’Neil, Tony Parker, Dave Gibbons. Darick Robertson and many more at the Hilton Bayfront Vela Restaurant just behind the Convention Center from 5-7 p.m. Don’t miss out!

As always, Hero’s booth will be stocked with comics’ BEST talent, including your best chance to find George Pérez and Darick Robertson!

Hero Initiative booth schedule:

WED., JUL 17 (con hours 530-900)

600-900: Scott “Kaiser” Koblish

THUR., JUL 18 (con hours 900-700)

930-1130: George Pérez

1130-1230: Jon Bogdanove

130-330: George Pérez

330-430: Dan Jurgens

FRI., JUL 19 (con hours 900-700)

930-1130: George Pérez

1130-100: Darick Robertson

1200-130: Roy Thomas

300-430: Darick Robertson

430-630: George Pérez

SAT., JUL 20 (con hours 900-700)

930-1130: George Pérez

1130-100: Jerry Ordway

500-700: Darick Robertson

SUN., JUL 21 (con hours 900-500)

930-1130: George Pérez

1130-130: Darick Robertson

About The Hero Initiative

The Hero Initiative is the first-ever federally chartered not-for-profit corporation dedicated strictly to helping comic book artists and craftsmen in need. Hero Initiative creates a financial safety net for yesterday’s creators who may need emergency medical aid, financial support for essentials of life, and an avenue back into paying work. It’s a chance for all of us to give back something to the people who have given us so much enjoyment.

Since its inception, The Hero Initiative has had the good fortune to grant over $500,000 to the comics veterans who have paved the way for those in the industry today. For more information, visit www.HeroInitiative.org or call 626-676-6354.